Withdrawal period for a credit card in Belgium

The card has arrived, the contract is signed, and doubt sets in. Belgian law gives you 14 calendar days to withdraw without giving a reason, even if the card is already out of its envelope. The clock starts earlier than most people think, the form of your letter decides everything, and some issuers grant more than the legal minimum.

How many days do you have to withdraw from a credit card in Belgium?

Fourteen calendar days, with no reason needed. The rule is article VII.83 of Book VII of the Code of Economic Law (Livre VII du Code de droit économique), which governs consumer credit. A Belgian credit card is almost always a credit facility, so it falls within its scope.

Calendar means calendar. Sundays and public holidays count, and the day of signature does not. The contract itself must state that the right exists, how long it lasts, how to exercise it and the amount of interest due per day. A passing reference buried in the general conditions is not enough.

The figure to remember: the legal minimum is a floor, not a ceiling. In the general conditions of Beobank credit cards (version of 1 May 2024), article 19 reads "a period of one month". An issuer can always do better than the law.

Rates recorded from the issuers on 25 October 2026. Beobank publishes an APR of 14.49 % on a credit facility of EUR 2,150, with a variable actuarial borrowing rate of 13.98 %, rates in force on 9 May 2025. Fimaser publishes an APR of 14.50 % on a credit facility of EUR 2,500, of which 2.40 % a year is the card charge, with a variable borrowing rate of 11.22 %.

Does the period start at signature or when the card arrives?

At conclusion of the contract. Delivery of the card plays no part in the calculation.

The exception covers contracts concluded at a distance: if the contractual terms and the mandatory information reach you after signature, the period runs from their receipt. An online application on a Monday, a card received the following Thursday and terms downloaded the same day as signing therefore start the clock on the Monday.

In the files I handled, the confusion almost always came from there. The holder counted from the day the card dropped into the letterbox, the issuer from the electronic signature, sometimes eight or ten days earlier. In a dispute, what the issuer looks at first is the date of the last signature, and it sits in the contract's timestamp.

How do you notify the withdrawal so that it counts?

By registered letter to the lender, or by another durable medium the contract accepts. When in doubt, registered mail.

Here is the difference from a cancellation, which trips up many readers. For a withdrawal, sending is enough: notice is given in time if it leaves before the period expires, and the postmark counts. For a cancellation, it is the date of receipt that starts the notice period, as I explain in the article on cancelling a credit card.

At Beobank, article 19 requires registered mail to Beobank NV/SA, Customer Service, boulevard du Roi Albert II 2, 1000 Brussels. Four elements are enough in the letter: your name, the contract number, a clear statement that you withdraw from the credit contract, the date. No reason is required. Keep the post office receipt, it is your only proof of sending.

A back-office tip: send no later than day 10. A post office closed on a Sunday, a public holiday, a badly worded letter, and there is no margin left to start again.

What must you repay if you withdraw?

The capital drawn, plus interest accrued at the agreed borrowing rate. Nothing else.

Repayment is made without undue delay and at the latest 30 calendar days after the notice is sent. The lender may not claim any indemnity, except unrecoverable costs it has itself paid to a public body. Payments you made come back to you within 30 days, and ancillary contracts, such as balance insurance, end with the credit.

A worked example shows the cost stays small. You spend EUR 1,000 on the day the card arrives and post the letter ten days later. At the actuarial borrowing rate of 13.98 % published by Beobank, accrued interest comes to about EUR 3.83. At the 11.22 % rate published by Fimaser, about EUR 3.07.

Ten days of credit therefore cost less than a fee. That is the argument for withdrawing early, and it is the one brochures never put forward.

Is the annual fee due if you withdraw within the period?

In practice, no, because it has not yet been billed.

The Beobank conditions set it out in article 7. The first annual fee is billed on the date of the first account statement, provided that statement is drawn up at least one month after the credit is made available. Otherwise it goes on the next statement. Statements are monthly (article 12). Withdrawing within the month therefore avoids the EUR 5 fee in the normal case.

At Fimaser the fee is free the first year, then set at EUR 24 a year. The card charge of 2.40 % a year is counted on the balance: an unused account generates nothing. A fee charged all the same must be refunded, since payments made during the contract come back to the borrower within 30 days.

Can you withdraw after using the card?

Yes. The right does not depend on use, only the calculation changes.

Every drawdown becomes capital to repay, with its interest. Withdrawal undoes the credit, not the purchase. If you paid EUR 800 for equipment with the card, you owe that EUR 800 to the issuer within 30 days, and the equipment stays yours. For faulty or undelivered goods the route is different: the time limit to dispute a card payment and the claim against the merchant follow their own rules.

After withdrawing, one free check is worth making. The credit facility may have been recorded before your letter, and consulting your own data at the Central Individual Credit Register (Centrale des Crédits aux Particuliers) of the National Bank of Belgium costs nothing. How this register works is explained in the article on the Central Individual Credit Register.

Six situations, six periods

The period has passed: what is left?

Cancellation, which stays free. Article VII.98 of the Code of Economic Law allows you to end an open-ended credit at any time, with at most one month's notice.

A carried balance becomes due at the end of the notice period. If repayment is a problem, approved debt mediation services and the public social welfare centres (CPAS) handle these situations free of charge and can negotiate with the lender before any payment incident. The article on debt mediation details the steps.

If the issuer refuses a withdrawal posted within the period, write first to its complaints department, attaching the receipt. Without a satisfactory answer, Ombudsfin, the Belgian ombudsman for financial services, handles the case free of charge. This information is general. For a specific contract, the FPS Economy information line (ConsumerConnect, 0800 120 33) answers free of charge.

Before signing a new contract, the ranking of credit cards in Belgium gives the annual fee and APR card by card. The comparison tool places them side by side, and the choosing a card page sorts by situation. The steps of a first application are in the article on applying for a credit card in Belgium.

Sources. Withdrawal right for consumer credit: FPS Economy, ConsumerConnect, consulted on 25 October 2026. Articles VII.83 and VII.98 of Book VII of the Code of Economic Law, analysis of article VII.83: Credit2Consumer, consulted on 25 October 2026. Notification, postmark and repayment within 30 days: CreBelFin. One-month period, repayment of capital, fee and statement (articles 7, 12 and 19): general conditions of Beobank credit cards, version of 1 May 2024. Annual fee and APR recorded on 25 October 2026 from the public pages of Beobank and Carrefour Finance. Free recourse: Ombudsfin. No link in this article is remunerated.